


i sing the body electric

by viverella



Series: soft hearts; electric souls [1]
Category: Haikyuu!!
Genre: Canon Compliant, Childhood Friends, Falling In Love, Friends to Lovers, Growing Up, Growing Up Together, Light Angst, M/M, Oikawa Tooru's Knee Injury, Pining
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-04-01
Updated: 2020-04-01
Packaged: 2021-02-28 23:35:10
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 8,772
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23435518
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/viverella/pseuds/viverella
Summary: It was never part of the plan, falling in love with his best friend, but then again, most things in Iwaizumi’s life that involve Oikawa rarely unfold the way he thinks they will.(OR: how to fall in love with your best friend, step by step)
Relationships: Iwaizumi Hajime/Oikawa Tooru
Series: soft hearts; electric souls [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1685863
Comments: 35
Kudos: 459
Collections: THE BEST HAIKYUU FANFICS AHHHHH—, my favorite hq fanfics pls





	i sing the body electric

**Author's Note:**

> happy iwaoi day!!! I keep chickening out about posting this bc first fics for new ships always make me Nervous but on today of all days I feel like I must Commit™
> 
> like most of my fics I feel like it starts a lot better than it ends ~~but I can't seem to figure out how to fix the ending~~ and also this is the dumbest premise for a fic I've ever come up with but remember [that bit](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W87l2Zha0-I) from himym forever ago about the like four stages of saying "I love you"?? yeah.......................... consider this that I guess 
> 
> ANYWAY I've rly gotten Obsessed with these two over the past idk couple months or so bc you can't expect to dangle childhood friends in front of me and not expect me to completely lose my mind. it's been a fun experience since I actually wasn't super fond of oikawa the first time around watching haikyuu but as it happens I'm doing a reread of the manga rn and I read maybe one or two really good fics and I was _hooked_ and now I really can't stop thinking about them lmao so enjoy!!
> 
> title(s) borrowed from andrea gibson

**_i. i said to the sun “tell me about the big bang”_ **

Iwaizumi has always loved the summer. He loves the long days and the warm sun that leaves kisses in the shapes of freckles across tanned shoulders and chasing after fireflies until his mother calls for him to come inside every night. He loves his birthday and trips to the beach on the weekends and racing to finish wobbly ice cream cones before they melt past his fingers and onto the ground. 

And, maybe most of all, he loves that for just over a month, as cooler, temperate June fades into hot, sticky July, Iwaizumi is older than Oikawa. He loves it in the simple way children love many things – in reaction to, drawing reactions from, needling to test where the boundaries are, what he can get away with – and it’s mostly because it seems to annoy Oikawa so much. Oikawa looks at him and pouts the entire month when Iwaizumi brings it up ( _I’m picking what we’re doing today because I’m older!_ ), lower lip jutting out in a caricature of hurt even as he runs off into the woods with Iwaizumi to look for a little bit of magic every time Iwaizumi asks. Oikawa, who’s not quite so proud yet, whose smiles are colored with nothing but bright curiosity, who cries a little easier, less afraid of what the tears mean. Oikawa, who’s been there for as long as Iwaizumi can remember, clever and determined and already setting his sights on the stars, bursting into Iwaizumi’s house as if it’s his own, a quick patter of footsteps racing up the stairs after a hastily called _sorry for the intrusion_ in the front hall. 

“Iwa-chan!” Oikawa shouts as he flings the door to Iwaizumi’s room open. The days have been hot lately, and Oikawa’s still dressed in shorts even though it’s nighttime, colorful band-aids stuck carefully over scraped knees. 

Iwaizumi hasn’t quite perfected it yet, his boyish features not yet used to trying to be hard, but he tries for a scowl anyways. “I thought I told you to stop calling me that,” he snaps, but they both know he’s always been more bark than bite. 

Oikawa’s eyes are shining, and he laughs, high and bright, racing across the room to grab Iwaizumi’s hand and drag him off of his bed where he’s been comfortably curled up with a book. Iwaizumi’s halfway down the stairs already before it occurs to him to protest. 

“No time for that today, Iwa-chan!” Oikawa cheers, racing headlong, always, into whatever it is he’s narrowed in on today. “If we don’t hurry, we’ll miss it.”

Iwaizumi is eleven, old enough that his mother lets him wander out to the big hill behind their house after dark, young enough that he’s still taller than Oikawa, and Oikawa barely gives him enough time to slip on his shoes before pulling him by the hand out the door and into the night. Oikawa doesn’t even give him time to ask what they’ll be late for before they’re scrambling up to sit at the top of the hill against the backdrop of the Milky Way, Oikawa chattering the whole way about how he read about this in a book and he’s been tracking the movement of the stars and waiting all summer just for this, never mind what _this_ is. Iwaizumi crosses his legs under himself, leaning back on his hands on the cool grass as Oikawa points out constellations he recognizes ( _look, Orion_ , like he does every night they linger outside after dark. It’s his superpower, he claims, always being able to find it, no matter where they are). Iwaizumi supposes that, in the end, like with most things Oikawa latches onto and refuses to let go of, he probably won’t have to ask anyways. 

Next to him, as the minutes tick by, Oikawa falls quiet as he settles in to wait, hugging his knees up to his chest and staring intently at the endless sky like he’s daring it to do something. Even at ten years old, Oikawa has this way of looking at the world like he’ll always refuse to blink first, and Iwaizumi has never been able to figure out where it comes from, this determination he never seems to run out of, this boldness he carries in the set of his shoulders. He’s still so small, but no one else in Iwaizumi’s life has ever cast such a big shadow. 

Oikawa watches the stars in rapt concentration. Iwaizumi watches Oikawa. 

The silvery moonlight bounces off of Oikawa’s skin, light and delicate and liable to burn before getting the chance to brown in the summer sun, and catches on his waves of hair, windblown and messy in a way he’ll stop letting it get in a few years’ time. The pale light settles in the warm brown of his eyes, making it easy to catch the exact moment his expression shifts from pointed focus into excitement and wonder. His eyes widen and his mouth curves up into an awed smile. He lets out a breath that sounds like a soft laugh, surprised and pleased. Something stirs just behind Iwaizumi’s ribs. 

“Iwa-chan, look,” Oikawa says, his words a hushed, reverent whisper. He grabs Iwaizumi’s hand with one of his own and uses the other to point up at the sky. Iwaizumi can feel Oikawa’s hand trembling, just a little, and holds on a little tighter. Iwaizumi doesn’t have the heart to tell him off for the silly nickname Oikawa has gotten in the habit of using these past few months and won’t let drop. 

Iwaizumi tips his head up to take in the night sky, letting Oikawa guide him through the great expanse to what’s important, following the line of his finger to whatever treasure he’s found today. For a long moment, Iwaizumi can’t see anything out of the ordinary, just the stars twinkling like spilt glitter scattered across inky blue-black. He holds his breath. He thinks maybe Oikawa’s doing the same. He still doesn’t know what he’s waiting for, but Oikawa always seems to find a way to make it worth it, somehow. 

And then he sees it, impossible to miss in the darkened sky, a brief steak of light zooming across the heavens. A minute, and then another, and another, and another. Iwaizumi has to keep looking to spot them, almost afraid to blink lest he miss one, and he can’t help the way his mouth drops open in amazement. _Perseids_ , Iwaizumi remembers as he stares up at them, remembering poring over an encyclopedia at the library during the rainy months in the spring, Oikawa’s eager fingers pointing at this thing or that. 

“They came early this year,” Oikawa whispers. “I wasn’t sure if we’d catch them.”

Oikawa’s birthday is in three days, and Iwaizumi knows without having to ask that he’s probably been hoping that this would coincide with it, unlikely as that is, because Oikawa’s always asked for the world and refused to take no for an answer. Oikawa’s expression is delighted and thrilled, and Iwaizumi feels something quiet and tender fill his chest. _Close enough_ , he thinks. The universe gets a passing grade, this year. 

“Are we supposed to make wishes?” Iwaizumi asks, murmuring the words carefully between his lips like he’ll shatter the moment if he speaks too loudly. There’s something about it that feels delicate and precious, like he’s holding one of the many stars like porcelain in the palm of his hand, and he’s never really been very good at delicate things, too clumsy, too coarse. The hot summer air has cooled off in the night, bordering on chilly, but even though Oikawa hadn’t given him enough time or warning to grab a jacket before whisking him off like a human whirlwind, Iwaizumi doesn’t feel cold at all. 

Oikawa makes a soft scoffing sound. “This is a meteor shower,” he says, sounding almost offended by the question. Iwaizumi’s still trying to figure it out, what violates the Oikawa Tooru Code of Conduct and what passes muster. “That’s kind of cheating, isn’t it? Saving all your wishes for a night like this?”

Iwaizumi shrugs. “You cheat all the time,” he says. He doesn’t really mean it as a jab, but he knows Oikawa will take it that way anyways, or at least pretend to. 

Oikawa gasps and tears his eyes away from the sky for a moment to stare at Iwaizumi in mock offense. Oikawa’s a sore loser, even as a child, and more than once has resorted to underhanded means of winning even the littlest things. Who can run to the end of the block the fastest. Who can carry the most books home from the library. Who can shove the most marshmallows into their mouth at once. Iwaizumi laughs, feeling a little like he’s caught a bit of the starlight around them under his skin, buoyant and bright. 

After a moment, Oikawa gives up on trying to look wounded, and his face breaks out into a wide grin again as he turns back to the sky, too excited to pretend he’s anything but happy. He’s still holding onto Iwaizumi’s hand, and he squeezes it as a particularly brilliant meteor streaks across the sky. His palm is warm against Iwaizumi’s, familiar and grounding, an anchor keeping him tethered to the earth as the heavens wheel around them, and Iwaizumi’s heart hammers in his chest. 

The sky, the shooting stars, and Oikawa. Iwaizumi’s whole body feels full to bursting. 

Oikawa’s probably right. It’s probably cheating. But as Iwaizumi watches pieces of space burn up in beautiful trails of white against the dark sky, he finds himself wishing anyways. To remember this night forever. To never have to let go. To feel this light, this whole, for the rest of his life. 

  
  


**_ii. the sun said “it hurts to become”_ **

By their third year of junior high, Oikawa’s already a star. He’s always had a knack for figuring people out, shrewd eyes quietly and quickly picking apart every single person he meets down to the bare essentials and putting them back together before they realize it. He’s always worked harder at everything he’s put his mind to than anyone else Iwaizumi knows and still doesn’t know how to back down, how to lose. It’s no surprise, really, that he starts getting attention for his playing. Iwaizumi always knew it would happen. Even though the school year’s just started, rumors are already swirling about which high schools might be looking to recruit Oikawa and more and more classmates come to cheer him on during matches and the summer they turn fifteen, Oikawa beats Iwaizumi to the punch and hits his growth spurt, growing tall and willowy almost overnight, graceful limbs and long fingers fit for a setter. That awkward, bright-eyed kid that Iwaizumi has known his whole life comes back from summer break with the addition of several centimeters on Iwaizumi and a wicked serve, commanding and strong and elegant, all long legs and steady hands, charming smiles and effortlessly styled hair. 

It’s no surprise, really, when he gets confessed to for the first time. Iwaizumi always knew that would happen too. 

Iwaizumi doesn’t mean to see it, but he’s headed to the club room, jogging a little because he got out of class late, and he’s just ducking through one of the long, covered walkways connecting the gyms when the sound of laughter makes him pause. It’s Oikawa, and the sound is high and bright above the ambient chatter of students milling about, headed home or to sports practices or student council meetings. It’s just a laugh, but it’s sweet and warm and pleased, no overwrought affectations or carefully practiced charm like he’s started getting into the habit of doing at school, preening under the attention he’s started to attract. It’s the laugh that Iwaizumi grew up hearing ringing in his ears, comforting and familiar like it’s calling him back home, but this time, Iwaizumi suddenly feels very cold. 

There’s a girl with long, black hair waterfalling over her shoulders talking to Oikawa at the other end of the walkway. She’s pretty and petite, dimples pressing into her cheeks when she smiles, and the look on Oikawa’s face in return is one of those rare, quiet things that Iwaizumi never knew anyone else besides him had ever seen. Maybe no one ever has. Maybe this is the first time. She’s blushing as she says something and Iwaizumi’s too far away to quite catch it, but he’s sure he’ll hear every word of it later, and he’s got a pretty good guess besides. They’re properly teenagers now. This is what happens, eventually. 

As soon as the thought enters his mind, Iwaizumi’s stomach flips and he frowns at the feeling. He runs the rest of the way to the club room. 

It’s five minutes before Oikawa shows up. Iwaizumi thinks it’s maybe the longest five minutes of his life. 

“Iwa-chan!” Oikawa cheers as he bursts into the club room that day, mere minutes before practice starts and still dressed in his school uniform. “You won’t believe what just happened!”

Oikawa’s beaming, and it’s so brilliant that Iwaizumi has to look away, feeling a little like he’s staring at the sun. Iwaizumi fiddles with the zipper of his jacket, suddenly feeling a little queasy. He jumps a little when he feels Oikawa’s hands land on his shoulders, like stones dragging him back down to earth, and Oikawa shakes him urgently as the words tumble out of his mouth almost quicker than he can manage, tripping around the syllables. Getting stopped on his way to the club rooms after class and this girl and how sickeningly cute the whole thing was. Iwaizumi stares blankly, frozen, his tongue feeling like it’s made of lead. 

“Hello?” Oikawa says after he stops for a breath and gets no response, a teasing lilt to his voice. He waves a hand in front of Iwaizumi’s face. “Anyone home? Your poor brain finally give out on you?”

Iwaizumi blinks, every gear in his body kicking into hyperdrive in one burst, all the muscle memory from a lifetime of bickering picking up where his conscious mind has screeched to a halt. He narrows his eyes at Oikawa.

“I give it a week,” he says, and he doesn’t mean it, he doesn’t, really, but the words feel sharper in his mouth than his usual retorts. “She’s bound to figure out you’re a terrible human being sooner or later.”

Oikawa jumps back and gasps, eyes wide. Oikawa surprised is often a caricature of surprise, mouth dropped open and hand to his chest, just like he is when he’s pouting, just like he is when he’s trying to be cool. Oikawa isn’t the kind of person who knows how to do anything in halves, and it’s one of the things Iwaizumi has always liked best about him, but it’s also one of the things that scares him the most. 

“Mean!” Oikawa exclaims. “Why can’t you let me have nice things?”

Iwaizumi shrugs and slams his locker shut. “Someone’s gotta keep you humble,” he says gruffly as he makes his way to the door. He kicks half-heartedly at the back of Oikawa’s knee, making Oikawa’s leg buckle under him as he lets out a yelp. “Now come on, dumbass. You’re going to be late for practice.”

Oikawa doesn’t bring up the confession for the rest of the afternoon, not even after practice is over, not even after he’s done with his extra drills, not even as Iwaizumi yells at him to stop and helps him put everything away and drags him out the door so they can head home. All Oikawa talks about during practice is volleyball, like he always does, and all he talks about on the way home is a pop quiz he had in math earlier that day and how he’s gotten out of class late before lunch because he’d stayed to talk to his teacher and missed being able to buy the last milk bread, like he always does then, too. He bothers Iwaizumi to buy him juice as they walk past the vending machines by the little corner store a couple blocks down from their houses and whines when Iwaizumi reminds him of how much money he already owes Iwaizumi and it’s like nothing has changed, like nothing will. Like this whole thing will be just a tiny blip on the radar, nothing more. 

It’s two days and Iwaizumi thinking that maybe this isn’t going to turn out to be quite so consequential after all until he’s walking down to hall to Oikawa’s classroom to see if he wants to get lunch and he sees that girl again, giggling and talking with Oikawa, a hand tugging gently on his sleeve. Oikawa looks happy, the real kind instead of the plasticky façade he’s taken to hiding behind at school these days, the kind that reaches all the way up to his eyes, making them glow warmly from the inside out, and Iwaizumi holds his breath, an inexplicable lump suddenly forming in his throat. He wonders if he should find someone else to eat lunch with and then wonders why the thought sits so uncomfortably in his stomach. But then, like he senses Iwaizumi watching him, Oikawa looks up and spots him, grinning and lifting a hand up to wave, fingers waggling, and they end up getting lunch together after all, just them, Oikawa talking his ear off the whole time, and it’s okay, it’s okay. 

Except then, a week later, Iwaizumi’s sticking his head back into the gym after practice to make sure he doesn’t have to nag Oikawa about taking it easy and maybe see if he wants to walk home together, and he sees Oikawa talking to that girl again and his stomach drops as he takes in the scene. Oikawa’s reaching out to tuck a lock of hair behind her ear and he’s looking at her with this soft expression Iwaizumi has never seen before, and it startles him, that after knowing Oikawa for his whole life, there remains something like this, something so vulnerable and gentle, that Iwaizumi doesn’t know. When Oikawa laughs at something the girl says, Iwaizumi feels a sharp pang in his chest, his lungs emptying of air in a _whoosh_ like he’s been punched. 

(Oh.)

Iwaizumi turns and runs all the way home. 

Iwaizumi bursts through his own front door out of breath and flushed and hurried still, kicking off his shoes clumsily by the door before bolting up to his room without bothering to greet his parents, even as he hears his mother calling after him, asking him what’s wrong, like she can hear the panic in his footsteps. Iwaizumi takes the stairs up to the second floor two, three at a time and slams his door shut behind him, leaning back against it like it’ll keep out anything bad from happening, trying to slow his racing heart. There’s this ache somewhere behind his ribcage, slowly expanding out till he can feel it all the way down to his fingertips, and he has no idea what it means. It makes him want to do something stupid and impulsive like scream or throw something or just keep running and running and running and never stop, and he thinks and he thinks and the closest thing he can come up with that makes any kind of sense is just anger. He’s angry, but it’s an odd kind of anger, a kind where he can’t quite pinpoint ground zero, diffuse and heavy on his shoulders. He’s never felt this kind of angry before. He doesn’t even know what he’s angry about.

Iwaizumi flops down on his bed, arms spread out wide beside him, trying to squash the ugly feeling rising up to the back of his throat. He can’t tell where it’s coming from, this feeling like a wild animal trying to claw its way out of his chest, and he has no idea what he’s supposed to do with any of it, doesn’t even know what to call it. 

Iwaizumi stares up at the ceiling of his room, irritated. There are glow-in-the dark stars stuck up above his bed from when he was nine, Oikawa insisting that he needed them to dream, and if Iwaizumi squints, he sometimes thinks he can make out the constellations Oikawa was trying to map out on the ceiling. Iwaizumi remembers Oikawa jumping up and down on his bed to reach all the way up there until Iwaizumi’s mother had come knocking at his door asking what all the ruckus was. Iwaizumi remembers, too, the look on Oikawa’s face, the look he still wears so well to this day ( _I’m innocent! I swear!_ ), remembers how Oikawa collapsed on him in relief when Iwaizumi’s mother had left them alone again without a scolding, hugging him and laughing until Iwaizumi kicked him off the bed. Those wide eyes and that bright smile that tempt Iwaizumi to let him get away with so much sometimes. Those wide eyes and that bright smile that have made him so popular at school. 

Iwaizumi frowns up at the stars, his fingers itching with the urge to tear them all off. Oikawa is his best friend. Oikawa is happy. Iwaizumi should be happy too. It’s what would make sense. It’s how things are supposed to work. 

But Iwaizumi thinks about Oikawa laughing with that girl in the low light of the gym, a particular kind of quiet intimacy that Iwaizumi’s only ever read about in books hovering in the air, and all it makes him feel is small and petty and spiteful. His cheeks feel hot like he might cry, and his traitor heart won’t stop stuttering in his chest, restless and uncertain even though it’s been many long minutes since he stopped running. He thinks that he’d maybe hate Oikawa for starting all of this, if that didn’t hurt so much too.

( _Oh._ )

Iwaizumi grabs a pillow and smushes it over his face, letting out a scream muffled by the soft cotton.

This isn’t what friends do. 

  
  


**_iii. i carry that hurt on the tip of my tongue_ **

In hindsight, Iwaizumi supposes he should’ve seen it coming, and later, when he really thinks about it, he thinks that maybe he did, in a way. Accidents are bound to happen, especially if you’re flirting with the boundaries of danger almost every day, and it’s probably foolish to pretend otherwise. Like Murphy’s law or something. The underlying entropy of the universe. 

Oikawa injures his knee on a Wednesday during their second year of high school. By the time he’s patched up and sent home from the hospital, one surgery later, it’s Sunday, and it’s the longest almost-week of Iwaizumi’s life. 

It’s no big deal, Oikawa texts him as if Iwaizumi wasn’t there when the school nurse asked not if but how long he’d been playing on a painful joint. Minimally invasive, Oikawa says, and it’s a minor thing really and would Iwaizumi stop worrying so much because they barely even opened him up anyways. Oikawa sounds as confident as ever over text, teasing Iwaizumi about how all that anxiety is going to give him wrinkles and that’s the last thing Iwaizumi needs with a face like that, but Iwaizumi has learned by now how to read between the lines, has learned that the things Oikawa doesn’t say often mean more than anything he does. Oikawa texts, _I’m fine_ and all Iwaizumi can feel is annoyed. 

The day Oikawa arrives home from the hospital, Iwaizumi hops the fence between their houses and storms in without telling Oikawa, without giving him a chance to run away. He bolts up the stairs and throws open the door to Oikawa’s room and before Oikawa can look up and say hi, Iwaizumi’s all the way across the room and half-planted on Oikawa’s bed so he can grab Oikawa by the collar of his shirt and shove him back against the wall because a heavy hand has always worked best with Oikawa about the things he refuses to let himself see, stubborn and headstrong and always convinced that everything he does is what he has to do (or maybe just needing to convince himself of that version of reality because at this point, anything else would be too painful). Iwaizumi’s careful not to jostle Oikawa’s leg, but it’s about the only thing he’s willing to be delicate about. 

“Just how stupid are you?” Iwaizumi shouts, not waiting for Oikawa to come up with flimsy excuses or flippant deflections, all the concern from the past week boiling over into something that tastes sharp and bitter in his mouth. It’s like a kind of tunnel vision, the kind of irritation that Oikawa and Oikawa alone manages to pull out of him, Iwaizumi’s entire world narrowing to just this, the image of Oikawa’s leg buckling under him after landing from an awkward set, the panic in Oikawa’s eyes when they’d dragged him off the court all but kicking and screaming. 

“Why don’t you ever listen to me? Why do you always have to push yourself so hard?” Iwaizumi says, his voice coming out rough and maybe a little wobbly, but Oikawa doesn’t point it out like he would if these were better times. “What if it had been something worse? What if you—” 

_What if you couldn’t play volleyball anymore_ dies on Iwaizumi’s tongue before he can say it, the words sticking to the roof of his mouth, because it’s almost too terrifying to say, because he’s never known volleyball without Oikawa, doesn’t even know what that would mean, but he knows Oikawa’s probably heard it anyways. Iwaizumi takes a deep breath to try again, but he can feel the hot anger in the pit of his stomach ebbing away into something that aches, feels a weariness starting to settle into his limbs. He can feel everything, all of the stress and tension and frustration from the past several days, right at the back of his throat, a thousand things he wants to say and can’t, a thousand ways he wishes things had gone differently. It all sits like a stone in his chest, heavy and oppressive, and Iwaizumi’s hands start to shake. 

Oikawa lifts his hands and wraps his fingers around Iwaizumi’s wrists, not pushing him away or pulling him closer, but just holding him, long, slender fingers cool against Iwaizumi’s flushed skin, solid, grounding, like Iwaizumi’s the one who’s gone and fallen apart. Oikawa tips his head up to look at Iwaizumi properly for the first time since Iwaizumi barged in, and Iwaizumi swears he can hear his own heart crack in two. Oikawa’s got dark circles under his eyes like he hasn’t been able to sleep properly since that day and his hair is an absolute wreck and he’s so, so pale that he looks like he’d break if Iwaizumi touched him. He smiles, small and soft and sweet, and Iwaizumi thinks it’s the saddest thing he’s ever seen.

“I know,” Oikawa says instead of _I’m sorry_ , but Iwaizumi’s been learning Oikawa as a second language for as long as he can remember. 

And it’s like something punctures then, the world set back in motion now that Oikawa’s looking at him again. All of the pent-up energy leaves Iwaizumi in a rush, and he feels his shoulders sag, suddenly exhausted. He supposes he hasn’t been sleeping very well either. Iwaizumi lets himself collapse, just a little, awkwardly straddled across Oikawa’s legs to avoid bumping his knee, and he lets his head fall to Oikawa’s shoulder, hands still clutching at Oikawa’s shirt. 

“What was I—” (Iwaizumi stops. _No. Try again._ ) “What was the team supposed to do without you if you couldn’t come back from this?” Iwaizumi asks in a murmur, the words coming out more like a whispered sob than a question. “Did you even think about that?”

Oikawa’s grip on his wrists tightens, just so. His hair tickles Iwaizumi’s ear. He smells sweet, like the peach shampoo he always uses, and the cotton of his shirt is soft against Iwaizumi’s skin. 

“I know,” Oikawa says again, quiet and a little brittle, like he knows he’s been selfish, like he knows he’s been reckless (and of course he knows, Iwaizumi thinks, of course he does because he’s always been this way, pushing and pushing and pushing at everything until it snaps in two. Iwaizumi thinks, sometimes, that maybe he’s the only thing left in Oikawa’s life that he hasn’t broken. He thinks, other times, that maybe that’s a lie, too). 

They stay like that for a long moment, and Oikawa lets him, or Iwaizumi lets himself, a rare indulgence into things he never quite lets himself think about, taking the cover of worry and concern and hoping, a little, that Oikawa can’t read it in the hitch in his breath that it’s always been a little more than just that. A minute passes, two, three, the soft in-out of Oikawa’s breathing the only sound in Iwaizumi’s ear, before Iwaizumi thinks to himself that if he isn’t careful, if he lets himself keep doing this, he’ll probably end up doing something stupid (and he’s been so good about being so careful for so long). Oikawa’s always been touchy, saying all the things he doesn’t have the words for through the medium of his fingertips, and Iwaizumi’s always found it easier that way, preferring the doing of things over the saying of it, but not like this, never like this, never quite so careful and tender, never quite so quiet. 

(A little part of Iwaizumi wants to live in this moment forever.)

(A bigger part of Iwaizumi is terrified of what that would mean.)

Iwaizumi takes in a sharp breath, drawing himself back together, feeling a little too raw. He lifts himself off of Oikawa to sit beside him in bed, close enough that their shoulders bump, and leans back against the wall, closing his eyes as he lets out a heavy sigh. He’s so tired his bones hurt.

There’s a moment of uneasy silence, and part of Iwaizumi feels like he should say something but can’t, feels like he’s spent all his words for the day and all he can do now is wait. It’s when he feels Oikawa drop his head onto his shoulder, Oikawa leaning into his side like he doesn’t know how to hold himself upright anymore, that Iwaizumi opens his eyes again. Oikawa’s eyes are hidden behind a cloud of tangled hair, but Iwaizumi can still see the tense clench of his jaw, can still catch the layer of pain in his frown. He wonders what Oikawa’s thinking, if he’s replaying that afternoon over and over and over again in his mind like he does after they lose a match, if he’s beating himself up over yet another reason he thinks he’ll never be good enough. 

Another sob swells up in Iwaizumi’s chest. He hesitates, and then lifts a hand to rest gingerly on Oikawa’s thigh, just above the knee, right at the edge of the bandages holding him together. Oikawa lets out a shaky breath, a little like he did that Wednesday, when Iwaizumi had carried him to the nurse’s office, and for a moment, Iwaizumi can’t breathe. 

He can still see it, sometimes, when he closes his eyes, flashing behind his eyelids like stop-motion film—Oikawa landing at an awkward angle during the practice match that day and collapsing immediately, Oikawa’s sharp cry as he’d hit the ground, the desperate determination in Oikawa’s eyes as he’d insisted _I’m fine, I’m fine, I’m fine_ , even as he grit his teeth against the pain, very plainly _not_ fine at all. It still hurts to remember it, the way Oikawa protested even as their coach said he’d be benched for the rest of the day one way or another, the way Iwaizumi knows Oikawa wouldn’t have stopped if Iwaizumi hadn’t intervened right then ( _Oikawa_ , softly, and Oikawa had whipped his head around to stare at Iwaizumi with such a fierce intensity that to anyone else it must’ve read as anger, but all Iwaizumi can remember seeing is fear). Oikawa had let him lead him out of the gym then, deflating all in one go when Iwaizumi had just shaken his head once, silently, almost pleading, _don’t do this_ , and he’d managed to make it just out of the door, one arm slung over Iwaizumi’s shoulder and letting himself be half-carried by the waist as it was, before collapsing entirely, like now that no one else could see him, his body had given up. Iwaizumi had barely caught Oikawa before he hit the ground, Oikawa suddenly shaking, his breaths coming out in pained, labored gasps, and Iwaizumi had tried to figure out when Oikawa had learned that this was the only way to be strong. 

Iwaizumi had ended up having to carry Oikawa all the way across campus to the nurse’s office, carefully cradling Oikawa in his arms and wondering a little when Oikawa got this tall, his legs so long, because he hadn’t remembered carrying Oikawa being this unwieldy even just a couple years ago. Oikawa had buried his face Iwaizumi’s shoulder and clung to Iwaizumi’s neck and pretended like he wasn’t crying, pretended like Iwaizumi couldn’t feel the way his body trembled, couldn’t feel the dampness against his skin, and it had felt a little like this, now, Iwaizumi aching all over almost like _he’s_ the one who’s been injured. 

“Iwa-chan,” Oikawa says softly, voice thick, and it hits Iwaizumi like a knife to the chest. 

“Thank you,” Oikawa says, and what Iwaizumi hears is _please don’t leave me_. 

Iwaizumi stares at Oikawa, heart in his throat, wishing desperately, helplessly, that he knew what to say, what to do. He’d give anything, he thinks, to get that look off of Oikawa’s face, that look like the whole world’s ended and there’s no way out. He’d pull every star out of the sky, if that’s the price that Oikawa demanded. As soon as the thought enters his mind, it startles him, the idea that he could feel so strongly about one person. It startles him, shooting up his spine like lightning, and then, a moment later, it doesn’t. He tries to remember a time when it didn’t feel like Oikawa didn’t feel like the ground zero he’d always end up coming back to, tries to remember what it felt like to be able to say _no_ to Oikawa when he’d gotten his heart set on something, tries to remember if that’s even a memory he has, and finds that he can’t. Maybe he always would have moved heaven and earth for Oikawa, he thinks, except that this is the first time it’s felt like he’s really been asked to do it, the first time he’s really understood that there are things in the world that you can’t come back from, that there are some mistakes that will remain permanent, that there are some things that can’t be fixed, no matter how much you try. 

Oikawa’s knee will heal, and he’ll be able to keep playing volleyball, but there will always be just that much more risk. Next time (and just thinking of a _next time_ makes Iwaizumi’s heart stop in his chest) he might not be so lucky. 

“Just get better soon,” Iwaizumi says quietly, knowing in his heart of hearts that if (when) next time comes, he’ll be here too (and the time after that, and after that). 

Iwaizumi lifts a hand to run through Oikawa’s hair, gently working through the knots, and Oikawa sighs softly, leaning further against Iwaizumi, pressing his face into the crook of Iwaizumi’s neck. His anxious hands clutch at the hem of Iwaizumi’s shirt. Oikawa’s bigger than him now, taller, but curled into Iwaizumi’s side taking in one shaky breath after another, he seems so small and fragile. 

_You’re a difficult person to love sometimes_ , Iwaizumi thinks, not for the first time, almost lets himself say, almost lets himself slip, feeling the impulse right on the tip of his tongue, right about to spill over the tops of his teeth, and then he swallows the words back down.

( _No. Try again._ )

  
  


**_iv. and whisper bless your heart every chance i get_ **

Iwaizumi wakes up on the first morning of the new year to Oikawa banging on his door and an odd feeling lingering just at the edges of his peripheral vision. As Oikawa rummages through his dresser and chatters on about something or another and tosses him clothing to wear, Iwaizumi still feels the pull from his dream tugging at him, the feeling of chasing down something just out of reach, the feeling of free-falling to the rhythm of a myoclonic jerk. 

It stays with him, even as they head out on their annual pilgrimage to the nearby shrine, and Oikawa tells him about his own dream, gesticulating wildly to make a point, and Iwaizumi half listens, half turns over in his head the thing that’s been bothering him for some time now, a kind of dull anxiety about the great unknown that stretches out in front of him. Iwaizumi thinks about the year ahead of him and doesn’t know anymore how to make sense of what’s coming. He thinks about college and can’t picture what it’ll be like. He thinks about volleyball and feels an odd itch in his fingertips. School and the court and Oikawa. After eighteen years, the three things are so tightly linked in Iwaizumi’s head that he doesn’t know what any of it will be like without him.

They haven’t really talked about it, not really, not since that night after their defeat in the Spring Tournament qualifiers, but Iwaizumi thinks that he’s probably known for a lot longer than he’s cared to admit to himself. He’s known since Oikawa had gotten all cagey at the question of what he was going to do after high school, shrugging all too casually and saying _I don’t know if college is going to be the thing for me_ as if he hasn’t gotten top marks all through high school, as if between that and volleyball he couldn’t have written his own ticket to literally any university he wanted. He’s known since the first time he caught Oikawa staying up till two in the morning practicing and practicing and practicing, a kind of obsessive hunger in his eyes that thrills and terrifies Iwaizumi to this day. He’s known since they were kids and Oikawa had looked at him with wide, shining eyes after that exhibition match Japan had played against Argentina and said _that’s going to be me someday_ without even a sliver of doubt in his voice. Oikawa was always going to end up going somewhere Iwaizumi couldn’t follow. 

So, that morning at the shrine, Iwaizumi closes his eyes and prays. He prays for Oikawa to learn the meaning of moderation, for him to stay happy and healthy and whole without someone reminding him that the world spins on outside of volleyball. He prays that Oikawa will find what he’s looking for, even if he has to go halfway around the world to find it. 

_Bring him back home to me in one piece_ , Iwaizumi thinks and only realizes after he’s opened his eyes again, after he’s added in a quick prayer for a good start to college and his parents’ health, that he can’t think of home and imagine that it’s anything but wherever and whenever Oikawa will find him again, even if he doesn’t yet know where or when that is. Beside him, Oikawa’s eyes are still shut, his eyebrows furrowed a little in concentration, chin ducked behind the scarf he stole from Iwaizumi on the walk here after complaining about the cold, and Iwaizumi wonders if a year from now, he’ll have to make the trek to the shrine alone for the first time in his life. 

On the walk home, they cut through the park where Iwaizumi broke his wrist falling off the monkey bars when they were eight, and Oikawa manages to gather up a handful of snow without Iwaizumi noticing and he stuffs it down the back of Iwaizumi’s shirt, running off cackling as Iwaizumi yelps and flails before sprinting to chase Oikawa down. He catches up to Oikawa by tackling him into a snowbank, grabbing handfuls of loose powder to throw in Oikawa’s face, and Oikawa laughs and laughs and laughs, ringing out clear and bright like a bell through the still air, cheeks flushed from the cold as he shoves at Iwaizumi to free himself from under him. As he falls back in the snow, Iwaizumi can feel his clothes already starting to get soaked through, but he finds himself feeling warm despite it all, heart thumping in his ears. 

When they arrive back home, Oikawa invites himself over and Iwaizumi’s mother takes one look at them and points her finger towards the stairs, saying with the weary tone of a woman who’s seen it all before, “Both of you. Shower. Now.”

And this, too, is tradition. Oikawa’s never seen a fresh snowdrift and not felt the urge to create just a little bit of chaos, and Iwaizumi can count on one hand the number of times he arrived home still clean and dry after their visit to the shrine. Iwaizumi watches as Oikawa rifles through Iwaizumi’s dresser as if it’s his own looking for some dry clothes to change into, and he thinks to himself suddenly as Oikawa calls dibs on first shower and all but skips out of Iwaizumi’s room that there are a lot more things that are ending than he realized. Oikawa’s humming something when he walks back into Iwaizumi’s room some minutes later, cozy in a borrowed, roomy sweater, and the sound echoes in Iwaizumi’s ears even as he cranks the shower as hot as it will go and squeezes his eyes shut against the sharp tug in his chest. 

( _This is the last time_ , he keeps finding himself thinking. _It will never be like this again_.)

Oikawa’s sitting cross-legged on Iwaizumi’s bed when Iwaizumi returns from his shower, and Oikawa’s hair is still dripping fat droplets of water onto the towel slung across his shoulders. He’s looking at something on his phone, distracted, and Iwaizumi sighs, but it’s mostly fond. 

“Hey, dry your hair, dumbass,” Iwaizumi says as he towel-dries his own hair. “You’re gonna catch a cold.”

Oikawa looks up from his phone and his wide brown eyes light up when they land on Iwaizumi. There’s an edge to his expression like he’s up to something, and it takes a moment and Oikawa throwing his phone aside and smiling expectantly at Iwaizumi before it clicks. Iwaizumi rolls his eyes, even as he walks over to Oikawa.

“What are you, five?” Iwaizumi grumbles. “Dry your own damn hair.”

Oikawa tips his face up, his mouth caught in a sugary sweet smile. 

“But Iwa-chan does it so much better,” Oikawa says, a little singsong, and the whole thing has no right to be as charming as it is. 

Iwaizumi scowls and rolls his eyes again, and he can’t see what his face looks like, but he’s sure it looks too soft to have any real bite to it, because Oikawa’s still grinning at him and closing his eyes as Iwaizumi reaches for the towel. Oikawa hums, content, as Iwaizumi gently works through his hair, and Iwaizumi’s suddenly hit by a wave of affection so strong he almost can’t breathe. Maybe it’s just that it’s a new year. Maybe it’s that Iwaizumi knows that whether he’s ready for it or not, this will be a year filled with too many changes, too many new things, a new school and new team and living away from home for the first time, living away from Oikawa for the first time. Because it’s not like they haven’t done this before, because Iwaizumi’s lost track of how many times Oikawa’s made Iwaizumi’s home his own, borrowing his shampoo and his clothes and his bed, sometimes, too. But Iwaizumi is suddenly acutely aware of the weight of each precious minute slipping by him, like he’s experiencing it all for the first time all over again. It’s a feeling he’s been getting more and more lately, hitting him at odd intervals when he least expects it. When he gets bored and texts Oikawa in the middle of class, one classroom down the hall from him. When Oikawa catches his eye as they pass each other in the halls at school and winks, cheekily. When Oikawa tips his head back and smiles up at the bright afternoon sky as they walk home from school together, now free of practice with hours of unscheduled time stretching out before them. 

Oikawa blinks his eyes open, a quick flutter of long eyelashes over sharp cheekbones, and Iwaizumi realizes that his hands have stilled. Oikawa’s hair is mostly dry now, and Iwaizumi lets the towel fall back down on Oikawa’s shoulders. The corner of Oikawa’s mouth twitches up into a small smirk. 

“You done?” he asks, a playful lilt to his voice. “Am I beautiful?”

Oikawa’s hair is messy and a little tangled, and his pale skin is a little flushed still from the hot shower. The oversized sweater he’s wearing hangs crookedly on his slender frame, draping over his shoulders just so to reveal sharp collarbones and the smattering of freckles across the ridge of his shoulder that almost perfectly line up with the constellation Perseus. Oikawa’s eyes are shining with mirth, bright and fond, and Iwaizumi thinks, _yes, always_. Thinks, _for as long as I can remember_. Thinks, _even when you’re sick, even when you’re crying, even first thing in the morning when you won’t let anyone else see you._

Iwaizumi reaches out to brush Oikawa’s hair away from his face, his hand moving before he has the chance to remember how much Oikawa can read from a touch alone. Oikawa’s looking up at Iwaizumi now with an odd sort of expression that Iwaizumi has never seen before (except maybe he has, once, in the low light of the gym after practice, and not for him. Maybe). Oikawa catches Iwaizumi’s hand as he draws it back, light fingertips against warm skin, anchoring him in place with the tiniest of gestures, and Iwaizumi wonders if Oikawa can feel how his pulse is racing under his skin. It’s been a long time, Iwaizumi thinks, since he admitted to himself that somewhere along the line, between sleepovers and secrets murmured under the safe cover of nighttime and blankets and late practices that saw them racing the sun to make it back home, between all the teasing and the shouting and the scraped knees and bruised elbows from fighting or falling, he’s gone and given away his whole heart without meaning to, without really even realizing it. 

(He’s thought a lot less about what comes after.) 

(He’s realizing that it scares him more than he cares to admit.)

“Yeah,” Iwaizumi says quietly, letting himself be a little honest, because what is the start of a new year for if not for trying to be a little better, a little realer. 

Iwaizumi half-expects Oikawa to laugh, to puff up and make a joke like maybe he would any other time, but instead, Oikawa just stares at him, the corners of his mouth debating about whether to let a smile through or not, the amused edge to his expression gone completely in favor of something a little warmer and a whole lot softer. 

Oikawa tightens his on Iwaizumi’s hand just so, lacing their fingers together, and Iwaizumi’s heart lurches in his chest, daring him to be reckless. His skin tingles with the phantom touch of a literal lifetime of little things. The way Oikawa’s palm sits against his own when he reaches out to give Iwaizumi’s hand a quick squeeze before important matches, promising victories he can’t possibly know they’ll have. The way Oikawa’s careful, steady hands patiently wind athletic tape around Iwaizumi’s jammed fingers, not taking no for an answer when he asks if Iwaizumi wants help. The way Oikawa silently thanks Iwaizumi for a match well played, for his trust, for his strength, fingertips skating over the back of Iwaizumi’s neck as he walks by. 

“Iwa-chan,” Oikawa says, almost in a whisper. Oikawa, who so often hides his truth behind so many locked doors and yet somehow manages to say so much with just a glance. Oikawa, who looks like he’s asking for something, like he’s waiting for something, still, and Iwaizumi knows, he _knows_. 

Iwaizumi lifts his free hand up to cradle Oikawa’s face, running his thumb along the line of Oikawa’s jaw. 

“How long, exactly, were you planning on just sitting around waiting for me to do something first?” Iwaizumi asks, but he doesn’t sound halfway as annoyed as he tries for. 

Oikawa lets the smile slip through then, one of those rare, small smiles that Iwaizumi sees so rarely these days, the one that softens the sharp lines of his features into something almost achingly sweet. 

“I was thinking I’d maybe give you till graduation,” Oikawa says, light and a little teasing now, but no less warm and fond. “Though I was pretty sure we’d get here eventually.”

Iwaizumi shakes his head, but he can feel the smile tugging at the corners of his own mouth. “Why?” he asks, mostly just to be difficult.

Oikawa huffs out a breath. “Well, you probably wouldn’t have believed me even if I’d said something,” he says, only sort of succeeding at sounding offended by the question. 

“Yeah, well, maybe if you weren’t such a shit all the time, I’d be more inclined to believe you,” Iwaizumi says.

And even though neither of them really mean any of it, even though they both know that this is a sort of game they play, too deeply ingrained to ever grow out of, Oikawa gasps softly, and the look on his face is so indignant that Iwaizumi almost laughs, but then Iwaizumi leans in to kiss him, and the sound gets lost in favor of just this, Oikawa’s mouth on his, the warmth Iwaizumi can feel spreading through his body all the way down to his toes, the feeling trapped just under his skin like he could burst at any moment. Oikawa’s hands come up to bunch in his shirt, tugging him closer. Oikawa’s hair when Iwaizumi runs his fingers through it is still slightly damp but so unbelievably soft, and Oikawa’s hands on his chest are warm and steady through the thin cotton of his shirt. Oikawa kisses him like he does everything else that he loves, everything else that he wants, fervently and impatiently and completely, like he despite what he’s said he couldn’t have waited any longer even if he’d wanted to, like this, too, is something he’d run halfway across the globe to find. 

Iwaizumi can feel how red his cheeks must be when they pull apart, and between his racing heart and the way his breath comes out in quick, stuttery little gasps, he feels a little ridiculous and loopy, but Oikawa doesn’t tease him about it, opting instead to smile softly at Iwaizumi in a way that he realizes has maybe always been reserved just for him. Iwaizumi lets his forehead rest against Oikawa’s, lets Oikawa lift his hands to run his fingertips ever so carefully across the planes of Iwaizumi’s face, the sweep of his cheekbones, his jaw, the curve of his mouth. Iwaizumi thinks about the kind of power Oikawa brings to the court in the callused palms of his hands and marvels at how Oikawa never forgot how to make them gentle. 

“Hey,” Iwaizumi murmurs, leaning a little into Oikawa’s touch.

“Mmm?” Oikawa hums, tipping his head up to press a light kiss to the corner of Iwaizumi’s mouth.

“I love you,” Iwaizumi says, and it feels like letting go of something heavy that’s been sitting on his chest for months and months, feels like a dam bursting, like finally waking up after a long dream. 

“I know,” Oikawa says softly instead of something like _I love you too_ , but Oikawa’s hands have always been the most honest part of him, and his touch is almost reverent. 

_I know_ , Oikawa says, and what Iwaizumi hears is a promise. 

**Author's Note:**

> I have ideas for at least one more fic in this vein for another haikyuu ship ~~and maybe one non-haikyuu ship~~ so I'm tossing this into a series and lets keep our fingers crossed that I actually follow through on that, yeah?
> 
> thank you so much for reading! any kudos/comments are so appreciated!
> 
> my [tumblr](https://youichi-kuramochi.tumblr.com/) / [twitter](https://twitter.com/kura_ryous) for those interested


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